Thursday, July 22, 2010

Palm Springs Area Update

I spent a few days in the very warm Palm Springs area for work last week. I had only a few brief periods to scan the federal bands and came up with these. Some I have identified thanks to the work of the Southern California listeners who send me updates. A couple I haven't figured out for sure.

163.6250,N141 DHS BORDER PATROL-INDIO

164.9375,103.5 USFS ANGELES NATIONAL FOREST - ADMIN NET
165.2875,N650 DOJ BATFE NET 1
166.6375,N183 DHS BORDER PATROL-TEMECULA EAST
166.9125,N245 DHS BORDER PATROL-MA 4 SANTIAGO PEAK
166.9750,97.4 DOI BLM?
168.8000,N170 DHS BORDER PATROL-JIOPSP JOINT OPS
169.8750,123.0 USFS-SAN BERNARDINO NF?
169.8750,151.4 USFS-SAN BERNADRINO NF?
170.2250,103.5 ?
171.4750,103.5 USFS-SAN BERNARDINO NF?
171.6250,N153 DHS BORDER PATROL?
172.2250,103.5 USFS SAN BERNARDINO NF-ADMIN NET
172.3750,103.5 USFS ANGELES NATIONAL FOREST
172.9000,N001 DHS TSA @ KPSP
173.7125,167.9 FBI SURVEILLANCE OPS, SOME DES
415.0750,CSQ USFS LINK
419.5250,167.9 RELATED TO 172.7125?

Wednesday, July 21, 2010

169.8250 P-25

While driving to the airport in Portland, OR today, I came across at least two mobile units talking on 169.8250 MHz, simplex, P-25 NAC293. From the conversations they were definitely not from the area and were looking at maps trying to figure out how to get through Portland on I-84 to I-5 northbound.

This caught my attention because this frequency is part of the assignments used by the US Geological Survey at Mt. St. Helens, (http://mt-fedfiles.blogspot.com/2010/05/usgs-mt-st-helens-frequencies.html). A few times a year, listeners in the Portland area have reported weak P-25 traffic on the USGS channels, but we could never figure out where it was coming from.

No real idea who these guys are with, but one mentioned that one of the vehicles in their convoy was a "full sized truck". One unit also pointed out a "tower" and said that they had "worked on those lines before". Don't know if they meant power or RF type of tower.

The frequency could be any number of agencies, mostly Department of the Interior agencies, including USGS, BLM, Bureau of Mines, etc..